in my hands
by Yui Miyamoto
Summary: [In progress - part 4] Hatori and Akito's relationship has gotten deeper than they could imagine. Akito doesn't believe in happiness and Hatori can't ask for salvation...
1. Part 1

Disclaimer: yui doesn't own Fruits Baskets, but the poem below is hers.  
  
This was a game they played. A game in which the players didn't know they were playing, and yet they noticed that it was a consistent pattern. A violent pattern splattered with amethyst, emerald, and dark blood.   
  
Colors etched and meshed together as if they belonged together from a single kimono. The fabric sewn well and sturdy, yet soft to the touch. A pattern filled with life, when it was actually used for death, without the black.  
  
The boy thought he could paint the sky with the colors and manipulate them with his will for he owned the lives of twelve beings. The green-eyed man was the one who told him he couldn't, but the boy insisted that he could have changed the faraway stars like a drunk.   
  
Maybe he was, after all the drugs handsome doctor had given him.   
  
But maybe there was an invisible drug. It held a taste of something both of them could never live without now...  
  
It's the poison that others find beauty in.  
  
It's called love.  
  
And if the boy chose to do as he pleased,  
  
The green-eyed doctor would do anything to fulfill that promise.  
  
Anything.  
  
in my hands.  
  
By miyamoto yui  
  
Part 1 - behind closed hearts  
  
It had been three years since that girl Tohru had come into the household as an outsider insider: the link of the Sohma family to the outside world. All of them (Kyo, Tohru, and Yuki) had gone to college and so it was kind of dull without knowing the mishaps as they happened. The rest of the family did as they wanted as long as they subjected themselves to Akito, but never came to his side of the property for quite some time.  
  
Momiji, who had grown to be quite beautiful despite the fact that he was a boy, was the only one brave enough to come visit Hatori. Haru no longer lived in the complex because he had defied Akito, even though it was not let out, and went to live with Yuki. At the present, he was living in an apartment with Yuki while finishing high school.  
  
Hatori had just made his rounds in the household and was able to rest for a bit as he looked up at the unblemished blue sky while he sat in his study, which was now next to Akito's bedroom. The doors were wide open with some kind of light coming in, but he took out a cigarette to smoke.  
  
There was a dark peacefulness around the lot. Slowly, but surely, Hatori had quietly dismissed the maids to never come into Akito's house. They were ordered to go to the others homes and help the others with whatever they needed instead.  
  
He had come to the point that he couldn't stand anyone near Akito.  
  
Gradually, Hatori, as tired as he was, had taken care of everything personally for about a year now, and the thought of staying away from Akito was unheard of after the Yuki/Haru incident. It was Hatori's excuse to others to let Akito be taken care by him.  
  
Inside, he was satisfied that he could because it was the best opportunity.  
  
After that incident, Akito would have frequent anxiety attacks as if he couldn't breathe. Without discretion, he'd call Hatori's name.  
  
That inhuman cry of, "Hatori! Koko ni oide yo!"  
  
The first time, which was the night of Haru leaving with Yuki, was for painkillers. But gradually, it came to the point that pills weren't enough. Hatori _became_ the painkiller...  
  
He would soothe his wounds by holding him in his arms. Akito would close his eyes while shaking violently while murmuring in anger at the world. Hatori would nod his head quietly while trying to stop his nerves from making him crack.  
  
Hatori patted his hair and pushed his bangs out of his way while Akito looked at him in surprise while he was being kissed on the forehead. At that point, Hatori looked from side to side in confusion, but he was going to become the pain killer...  
  
He began to cuddle Akito more into his arms while he kissed his neck. Akito took a deep breath as he tried to push Hatori away, but Hatori shook his head while whispering into his ear, "Trust me."  
  
Akito felt Hatori kiss him again as his hand was pushing the collar of his kimono and pulling off the string holding it all together...  
  
A year ago, the maids had to turn their ears away when Akito would scream Hatori's name so loudly from his bedroom. They couldn't figure out if they should have come in to help him out or just let the doctor take care of his pain, as the doctor had requested. It was fine when they came in by just knocking on the door, but once Hatori threw a pillow at the doorway while blocking the sight of Akito on his futon, they never came in again. Hatori looked down at Akito while wiping away the sweat on his forehead. That same morning, Hatori, who was dressed in a robe, opened the screen door quietly and shook his head while saying that he was 'taking care of the young master'.   
  
Hatori 'took care of him' all right. As he left his office, he closed the door and knocked on Akito's.   
  
"Come in," Akito said as he limply hung on the window looking out at nothing in particular.  
  
Hatori opened the door and shut it behind him as he walked up behind Akito, who wore a dark red kimono that Hatori had given him recently. He modeled it off to please him, but wondered why Hatori would spend so extravagantly on a kimono. It was just like him though, for he had always bought him little things on a whim.  
  
Once, it had been a paper bird. Akito had broken it while he had lost his temper over Yuki being too kind to someone other than himself.  
  
"It fits well," Hatori commented while Akito kept silent, still thinking of the broken paper bird made of blue hue.  
  
"You shouldn't buy me things. I always break them," Akito sternly said as he continued to look out the window while avoiding looking at Hatori. "But you're so stubborn, Hatori."  
  
"I know," Hatori wanted to tell him to answer all the things he just said to him, but he kept quiet while he stared at the kimono thinking how it made Akito look so healthy, despite his pale skin.  
  
"I'll be going to visit Shigure-san now. Is there anything you need before I go?" Hatori asked as he still stared into Akito's back. Akito, who felt the stare, turned his head slightly to Hatori and said, "Do what you want."  
  
"All right," Hatori said as he was about to turn around, but Akito pulled on his lab coat while whispering, "I never said that you could go."  
  
Pulling on Hatori's tie, he smiled seductively as he said, "Tell me when I'm going to die, Hatori. That's why you're being so nice to me, right?"  
  
Hatori stood in his place with his eye look at the ground while Akito's hands wrapped themselves around his waist. "Mmm...tell me, Hatori."  
  
"You're not dying anytime soon," he simply answered while sighing at the same question Akito asked recently.  
  
"Liar!" Akito shouted as he turned Hatori and pushed him onto his futon. While kneeling on the ground with his knees touching Hatori's ribs, he pulled on Hatori's tie. Looking at him desparately while trying not to lose his prideful look, he asked again, "Pity me, Hatori, and I'll kill you with my hand through your heart."  
  
"It's all right," Hatori answered nonchalantly while looking up at Akito without a change in expression.   
  
"It's the same thing anyway," he thought to himself while Akito gave him a sigh and a pout.  
  
"Tell me when I'm going to die," Akito said as he pounded on Hatori's chest lightly while closing his eyes trying not to betray any tears.   
  
"How many times do I have to tell you..." Hatori reached out for Akito's face and leaned his head up while trying to kiss him on the lips. "...I'm not tricking you."  
  
"Believe me," he whispered to Akito's ear while pulling Akito to the ground with him, but Akito wasn't listening as Akito opened his eyes.  
  
Dyeing Hatori's coat with an invisible liquid as Hatori hugged him warmly, Akito feared the future while trying to arrogantly push it away with his words and actions. But Hatori could see through it, couldn't he?  
  
As always, couldn't he see through him?  
  
Hatori closed his eyes while pulling Akito closer to make him believe him. Until now, Akito pushed himself far away from him no matter what he did. He remembered a song that a famous singer had sung on the radio:  
  
Beautiful, beautiful geisha.  
  
Smiling while hurting inside.  
  
Killing her feelings with her koto and kimono,  
  
While dying so wonderfully  
  
In my hands.  
  
Tsuzuku...  
  
--  
  
author's note: I've learned to like their pairing. Very different from my usual gentle or cute pairings. This is violent and yet they still call it 'love'. Obsessive. Yes, I understand that this is not as warm or romantic as I usually do, but I'm trying to capture the feel that I've seen through them, whether or not it may exist in the anime or manga. This is the interpretation (and freely done) I've taken of them.  
  
I was thinking of doing this from only Hatori's perspective, but then I thought that it would be complicated doing both of them at the same time. Since I needed a challenge to get further in writing, I thought I would do both Hatori and Akito.  
  
I don't know how long this will be or where this is going, but I just wanted to do it about one of my favorite pairings. I didn't know it was until I wrote 'more than anyone else'.  
  
Koko ni oide yo - come over here! 


	2. Part 2

Disclaimer: Yui doesn't own Fruits Basket.  
  
In my hands  
  
By miyamoto yui  
  
Part 2 - his silence said.  
  
For a long while, Hatori embraced him quietly as Akito dug his face into Hatori's shoulder in defeat. How could Hatori always have this affect on him? To make him utterly weak and defiant at the same time? He didn't want Hatori to look at him so differently, to be the opposite of what he had always presented to everyone.  
  
Yes, to Hatori alone he was vulnerable, and yet it made his tongue and expressions just as hurtful towards everyone, especially to the object of his affection. Akito couldn't help but think that there was something that Hatori wanted to say to him.  
  
And somehow, the numbness that was within him was closing upon itself. He couldn't understand what Hatori was trying to tell him even if Hatori told him so honestly and clearly.  
  
Couldn't this be a trick?  
  
Hatori's kindness was inherent and something he wanted to smear with his hand with his own blood. "Take it away," he mumbled to himself when he was a child when Hatori would calmly put a hand over his shoulder and look at him indifferently. Or, was that called calmness?   
  
Akito thought of him as a tranquil lake that never seemed to be fazed or disturbed by anything.  
  
A heart of ice and a calm lake could be mirror images, couldn't they?  
  
"We are the same in that respect..." Akito thought to himself with frustration.  
  
When he pushed himself a bit off, Akito leaned closely to brush Hatori's bangs away and saw the beauty he had bestowed on Hatori's face. Putting his fingers gently upon it, he looked at the crevice lovingly.   
  
"Mine," his tongue rolled out as he looked at Hatori, who had not once looked away from him.  
  
"Take me somewhere," Akito commanded as he rose to his feet and the kimono rose gracefully with him.   
  
And who was he to turn down Akito's request? He was like an idiot in love with a beautiful woman, following so blindly, he should have just willingly thrown himself off a volcano to die with less suffering.  
  
With that, Hatori cancelled his trip to Shigure's.   
  
From the tone of Shigure's voice, Hatori could tell that he knew something was wrong. Everything was wrong if it involved Hatori caring a little too much for his number one patient.   
  
Caring for him through mind and body...  
  
Especially through his body...  
  
Somehow that craving had sometimes clouded his own judgment.  
  
And his eye was proof of that decay within him.  
  
But it also hauntingly reminded him how much he sweetly took death in his arms...  
  
That disease called affection.  
  
He ended up taking Akito to the Sohma cabin up in the mountains saying to everyone that they shouldn't be disturbed. Akito needed silence and tranquility in order to recover from his 'nerves'.  
  
Akito laughed as he looked out the window when Hatori explained his 'excuse' to him. Leaning out the window while looking at the darkness of the trees contrasting with the moon shining on the lake, Akito's face became unreadable. You couldn't tell if he was thinking or feeling serene. Or, was he scheming something as he usually did? You couldn't tell at all.  
  
He glanced back at Hatori once in a while as if he were making sure that he would stay in his place. The shadows on Hatori's face, from this angle, made him look so refined, yet old.  
  
The moon was playing mean tricks on both of them.  
  
Hatori lit another cigarette as he spread his legs and leaned forward with his wrists leaning close to his knees. He looked frazzled as he avoided looking at Akito, who was too occupied about staring at the lake at that moment. Or so he thought.  
  
But Akito suddenly turned around and took the cigarette from Hatori's fingers. Pushing it into an ashtray, Akito leaned close to Hatori and climbed into his lap. "Silence indeed..." he mumbled as Akito put his arms around Hatori's neck.  
  
"Being quiet is quite boring, Hatori," Akito smirked as he looked into Hatori's eye.  
  
But Hatori continued to look at Akito with a faraway look and Akito didn't like it.   
  
"Just what have I done?" Hatori thought to himself as he stared into Akito's face.  
  
Crossing the line between just and unjust...  
  
Between what should and shouldn't be...  
  
They were experiences and years apart both in age and wisdom. And yet, Hatori couldn't live without this boy that had told him to stay away from him. Whether or not it was because he would later become the doctor of the household, but Hatori was always so persistent.  
  
Akito could never understand why.   
  
Hatori's dim eye was eating him alive ever so slowly. The jealousy of Akito was most apparent with this eye...  
  
...and that's why he couldn't bear to ever blame Akito no matter how many times people asked him why the hell he didn't complain at all.  
  
Oh no. It wasn't kindness at all.   
  
It was silent passion that made him feel like he couldn't breathe whenever Akito was near him.  
  
Was it sexual, spiritual, intellectual...what?  
  
He couldn't figure it out.  
  
In the end, you mess with nature and it'll screw you over...  
  
"You surprise me," Akito began to say as he leaned his head on Hatori's shoulder while still holding onto him. "Before, you acted like you couldn't live without me. The next minute, you won't even react to me."  
  
"Because you don't understand," Hatori simply answered as he glanced at Akito's face.  
  
"What's there to understand?" Akito began to laugh as he said, "I understand it perfectly. You're only being very kind to me because I'm dying. You feel sorry for me. Hasn't it always been that way?"  
  
"Yes, that's how it's always been," Akito thought sadly to himself as he looked into Hatori's face. "No one can be good to someone who loves to see others in pain, especially his special one."  
  
":Ah, Yuki..." he thought as he kept his eyes on Hatori. "Displaced anger because of _you_ and _you_ don't understand me at all, do you, Hatori?"  
  
At that, he got up suddenly and looked at Hatori with a scathing look. "That was your mistake, Hatori."  
  
"You act all grown up and yet you don't understand what it means to be an adult." He didn't even try to reach for Akito's red sleeve.  
  
"You're one to talk!" Akito lifted his chin as his eyes squinted at Hatori. "How dare you say this to me?"  
  
At that moment, Hatori caught his wrist and pulled him close to him. But Hatori's eye became quite serious as he scolded, "Don't push me, Akito."  
  
"Push you how?" Akito retorted back arrogantly.  
  
Hatori then pushed Akito down on the couch and held his wrists above him. "I've never felt pity for you. Say this again to me and I'll..."  
  
"You'll what?" Akito turned his head and pointed his head away from Hatori as if Akito smiled triumphantly. "It's not as if you've never done it before."  
  
"Because that's the only time you believe me," Hatori said with bitterness in his eyes and tongue.  
  
"I don't believe in love," Akito said with a straight face as he looked at Hatori above him.  
  
Hatori leaned forward as he whispered, "Then what do you believe in?"  
  
"I don't know." Akito answered with the same lost look he used to give Hatori when he was a little boy. But now, it was a stubborn expression blocking the once innocent boy inside of him.  
  
"Even until now, it isn't me," Hatori thought to himself as he stared down at Akito and he sighed in irritation.  
  
Scolding him still, Hatori gave Akito a firm look. "You should believe me, Akito."   
  
"I'll only let you burn in hell," Akito replied as he remained stubborn towards him.  
  
"As long as you give me something," Hatori said as he began to kiss Akito on the lips. Enjoying his lips and tongue as Akito would lightly protest.  
  
As Hatori pushed off collar of the kimono, he pushed Akito more onto the couch as Akito began to unbutton his pants. As Hatori pushed himself onto Akito, Akito began hold onto Hatori's back while wrapping his legs seductively onto Hatori's waist while he turned his head to one side while being kissed on the neck.   
  
As the sweat was falling down his face, his hands pasted themselves on Hatori's slippery face. He closed his eyes in pain as he whispered breathlessly into Hatori's ear. "Do whatever you want to me as long as you give me your soul, Hatori."  
  
His white fingers slid onto Hatori's neck as Hatori stopped while breathing heavily. Instead of letting go as he usually did, he held onto Akito lovingly. Reaching up Akito's bare back, his fingers clutched lightly onto Akito's slightly damp hair.  
  
"Can't breathe with you here. Can't breathe without you," his body was telling him.  
  
As Akito fell asleep shortly while the kimono loosely hung onto his waist with the tie, Hatori kissed his forehead and zipped himself up before going to the window that Akito had hung on.  
  
He looked at the moon at the darkness before him, Shigure's warning tone was stuck inside of his head. He knew how much Shigure disapproved of what he was doing and Ayame only could suspect, but was blind to it.  
  
"I have to attend to Akito because he has been having more attacks recently," he said to Shigure on the phone. "I'm sorry."  
  
"You're in love with the devil..." Shigure told him on the phone with a laugh.   
  
He had replied, "To each his own damnation."  
  
Click.   
  
Then, he went over to Akito and looked at the seductive pose Akito was in as he slept. The red illuminating the white, pale skin of one who hated the sun with a vengeance. His arms apart while his profile stared back at him. The hair now dried, spread all over the place like paint brushes had made it that way. His legs peeking from the opening where the two ends of the kimono met.  
  
Cheeks still pink from taking him.  
  
He didn't mind being in love with a beautiful devil.  
  
Leaning closely cheek to cheek, Hatori began to bite lightly on his ear, whispering,   
  
"I don't mind worshipping you until damnation."  
  
His silence said:  
  
I'll take your punishment.  
  
Tsuzuku...  
  
--  
  
Author's note: Remember, I'm just going through the motions. I'm trying to figure out what I really want from this fic.  
  
All I can understand is that Hatori is really going nuts too. His level-headedness is assumed by his silence. Well, weird as it may be, this is what I think would happen to them.  
  
Their relationship is really unhealthy... 


	3. Part 3

Disclaimer: Fruits Basket and Sweet Little Lies aren't mine.  
  
in my hands  
  
By miyamoto yui  
  
Part 3 - feeling torn.  
  
"'Tori~!" Ayame whined as he pulled on Hatori's sleeve.   
  
He lifted up an eyebrow as he stopped to look at Ayame. Turning around he answered, "Yes?"  
  
"I've been trying to get your attention for about five minutes now!"  
  
"Mmm..." he answered as Ayame became quite impatient.  
  
"You've been taking your courses really seriously. Even more overboard than you usually are," Ayame commented while resuming walking.  
  
Hatori nodded his head, but kept his lips sealed. He was thinking, but about different things.  
  
"You always know what you want," Ayume said with a sad tone and Hatori couldn't read his expression at that moment...  
  
"But the young master was shouting," the maid said to Hatori as he came back to chaos. He walked into Akito's room. He gave her a look as Akito shook his head. Throwing his pillow at Hatori he shouted, "Get him out of my room. NOW!"  
  
But Hatori kept his stance. He sent the maid away as he closed the door behind him. Leaning on the door, he crossed his arms to look at Akito.  
  
"I know what's best for you," Hatori had said with a straight face.  
  
Akito glared at him as his kimono was falling off his shoulders. He was pulling on the sleeves to keep them up. "Best for me?"  
  
Hatori pushed himself off and wrapped his arms around Akito while Akito shuddered in fear.   
  
This single act of grace was laced with self-infliction.  
  
Hatori's lips parted as they sucked on Akito's neck while he leaned back onto Hatori's warm body. "Stop it," he said while shaking his head slowly.  
  
Hatori pushed him on the wall while putting his hands over Akito's white ones, intertwining their fingers as he kissed him. Hatori said nothing as Akito turned around and slapped him across the face.  
  
Even though Hatori's lip was bleeding, his green eyes stared at the young Akito, who was trying to deny something to both of them, but he couldn't understand himself...  
  
"Ahh..." Akito said as he surrendered to Hatori as his tongue ran down his spine as he made love to him. His hands kept on groping onto Akito as if he would disappear and dismiss him as if he had never been there at all.  
  
He had wanted to touch him for so long even though it made his heart cringe at this wrongdoing.  
  
--  
  
At that moment, Hatori's fingers ran through Akito's hair and then seized the ends.   
  
He stared down at the body below him. Leaning forward, he kissed his ncek and whispered to the sleeping Akito, "Tell me lies. Tell me sweet little lies."  
  
Akito was only fourteen-and-a-half then when he kissed him until all of his bottled up emotions just took over, almost raping him. At the end of the whole thing, Akito held him and wouldn't let him out of his room for days.   
  
Everyone wondered what rigorous work the doctor must have been doing, but Hatori just smirked behind the screen doors of Akito's room. He liked the cold touch of this boy who almost looked like a girl.  
  
There was something about him that he couldn't ever explain to Shigure, Ayame, or anyone for that matter. No, they wouldn't understand the way he felt because it wasn't just a feeling.  
  
It had become a destructive way of life.  
  
Akito was only seven when he had a good look at him in a white kimono. Akito was hanging out the window with a tired look. It wasn't the usual menacing look that people thought was a part of him. No, Akito was just as bright as any other child.  
  
Hatori bowed his head forward in silence while passing by. He even found himself waving to the child that was said to be the core of their curse.  
  
He wondered what was that like. How did the child feel?  
  
Did the child even know?  
  
It was precisely at that moment that Akito found himself waving back at Hatori. Sickly as he was, there were rare moments when he was friendly to people. Most people thought that was an illusion, but Hatori knew all along.  
  
He was the one who had to watch Akito being told that he was going to die because of this curse.  
  
Being a child, Akito's lip quivered. He wasn't going to cry. No, he wasn't going to admit defeat to all these elders.  
  
When he left, he looked out the window to find that Yuki was outside.  
  
He didn't hate Yuki at all...  
  
But Yuki was out there and he was in here.  
  
Yuki looked just like him...  
  
But why was _he_ the one with such a fate?  
  
Things started to work in his head and they would contort with time...  
  
Hatori watched Akito leave and that night, he asked to see him. Akito didn't really know his cousin Hatori, but only as that strange stoic who waved to him from the window.   
  
Reading a book, Akito looked up to see two green eyes looking down at him. Hatori sat before him.   
  
Hatori spoke to him gently, "How are you?"  
  
Akito blinked his eyes at him. "..."  
  
He couldn't say anything.  
  
But at that instant, Akito found his hands forming into fists as he bowed his head. Tears were dripping onto his book and he turned around. Hatori hugged him from behind.   
  
"Don't touch me," Akito protested as he shook his head, not wanting to be pitied. Hatori held him closer and the tears came out even more.  
  
Hatori closed his eyes and said, "It's okay."  
  
"I don't want to die..." the young boy said in fear. "Why do _I_ have to die?"  
  
And why was Hatori there? Who was he to take care of him?  
  
What did he want from him? Wasn't that what all people wanted? They needed something from you.  
  
"Don't worry, I won't let you," Hatori said as he let go.   
  
Getting up, he left Akito stunned in his place.  
  
It was then that he wanted to become a doctor. Why?  
  
Was it pity? Or was it affection?  
  
No, he didn't understand it himself, but he knew it wasn't fair to Akito. People who didn't have the curse didn't understand. They could empathize, but they couldn't ever truly understand the pain of never being able to touch someone that intimately.  
  
And for him, the scar was even deeper than losing his eye.  
  
He could finally touch Akito, but Akito was far away from him.  
  
Very far away.  
  
Akito wouldn't let him in.  
  
Was it Yuki? No, he understood that Yuki was the cover for his inner struggle.  
  
Hatori positioned him on the bed as he slept soundly, but Hatori couldn't go to sleep. He only turned off the lights to look out into the darkness.   
  
Then, he felt Akito's hands touch him, pulling his face towards him. He pushed his tongue through Hatori's closed lips and forced his way in.  
  
This was the only way.  
  
You could only believe in what your senses could feel, right? Those were the only things that could tell you the truth. Words weren't anything.  
  
Pain or smiling...  
  
It was all the same to him.  
  
This was the only way he could tell Hatori without admitting it aloud. His words meant nothing and his body told the truth towards Hatori, if only Hatori could understand that much.  
  
--  
  
The next day, they went home and Akito took an afternoon nap. Hatori went over to Momiji's part of the lot because Momiji wanted to talk to him. He had heard from Shigure that Akito and him had gone to the cabin up in the mountains.  
  
Hatori sat in Momiji's black deskchair as Momiji sat on the bed with a pout on his face. "Hatori!"  
  
"What?" Hatori answered calmly while lighting up a cigarette.  
  
Momiji cleared his throat and sighed as he said, "I know you're concerned about Akito's health. We all are. We know it's only a matter of time."  
  
"No, he isn't dying," Hatori immediately answered. Whether or not it was out of denial remained a mystery to Momiji.  
  
"Stop doing this to yourself," Momiji said as he shook his head with his hands in fists. "_I_ know more than anyone what's going on here. Whether Shigure-san or Ayame-san realize it or not, _I_ know you more than anyone."  
  
Hatori looked away as he kept smoking his cigarette. "Why are you getting all upset? Calm down."  
  
Momiji got up in frustration. "This is what has happened ever since you moved into his house. You're not the Hatori I used to know then."  
  
The green eye remained unchanged.  
  
"I don't want to see you this way." Momiji stared into Hatori's profile.  
  
Hatori's lips slightly smiled as he said while still not looking at Momiji, "I like it this way."  
  
Shocked, Momiji took up Hatori's collar and shook him back and forth. "You act like you've been drugged. What's wrong with you, Hatori? You used to talk to me. Why are you holding this from me?"  
  
Momiji was close to tears but he would be damned before he even cried. "I was there when you lost Kana and I understood because of my mom. Why are you being this way?"  
  
"Poisoned," Hatori had wanted to say but he kept quiet.  
  
"Please listen to me, Hatori," Momiji pleaded with concerned eyes.   
  
"I have to get back to my office, Momiji," Hatori finally spoke up with a harsh tone.  
  
A tear fell from Momiji's eye as he slowly let go of Hatori's shirt collar. In shock, he looked at Hatori in disbelief. Years ago, Hatori wouldn't have ever been that mean to him.  
  
But Hatori turned a deaf ear and blind eye as he got up to leave.  
  
"There are two kinds of love that exist in the world," Momiji spoke up. "They'll tell you it's between true and false or unrequited and being loved back, but that isn't how I think."  
  
Hatori stopped walking and stood in his place to listen.  
  
Without turning his head to look at Hatori, he blinked his eyes with more tears falling. He couldn't catch them from dropping and he felt like his heart was pouring out before him.  
  
But he wasn't weak. He wasn't going to be weak about this.  
  
Momiji walked in front of Hatori and looked into his face. "For me, the two kinds of love are understanding and not understanding."  
  
Reaching up to Hatori's collar, he shook his head and smiled, "But why am I feeling both of them at the same time?"  
  
Pulling Hatori's collar, Momiji kissed him passionately on the lips.  
  
Tsuzuku...  
  
--  
  
Author's notes: I know there just seems to be (blatantly) lots of 'scenes', but I can't imagine this pairing without it being so sexual. That scene with Akito pulling on Hatori's tie in the series struck me as both beautiful and disturbing. It stuck in my head and is always the unconscious reference that I believe is this pairing.  
  
This is going much faster than it shouldn't it? ^_________^ Hee. You really thought I was just going to leave it with Akito and Hatori? Oh no no...I don't want to make it that easy...  
  
I'm evil, aren't I? * smiles * And I'm enjoying it! 


	4. Part 4

Disclaimer: yui doesn't own FruBa.  
  
In my hands  
  
By miyamoto yui  
  
Part 4 - especially for my sake.  
  
Hatori closed his eyes for a moment and then, he pushed Momiji away from him. With a stern look on his face, he stared at Momiji with a vicious look. "What the hell are you doing?"  
  
He wanted to look away, but inside, he was on pins and needles. They were puncturing him invisibly and he could feel the trickles of blood spots flowing out of his body.  
  
"It would have been better if you had just slapped me, 'Tori," Momiji said as he looked to one side. He wouldn't look at Hatori, but he wasn't embarrassed. He just didn't want to bear Hatori's unforgiving expression. "But I'm not ashamed."  
  
With this, Hatori turned around to leave in supposed impatience. "You're too young to understand this."  
  
Momiji answered back hurtfully, "When have you ever known me to hold back? That's your department."  
  
A clean slice to kill each of their hearts.  
  
The executioner and the convicted.  
  
Hatori then left, but as he exited Momiji's room, he walked quickly to the front door. Looking at his office and at the direction of Akito, he walked away from both of them. He was walking towards the main entrance. And so, without even taking off his coat or a word, he left.  
  
When he found himself on some bridge, he leaned his hands on the railings and then he gripped them for dear life. Putting his head down, he sighed aloud. "How irresponsible."  
  
He didn't know who was worse. Was it himself? Or was he talking to Momiji?  
  
No matter who, it was really penetrating his heart like the tip of a sharp arrow opening it for more of his blood. And it was leaving its sting to the air of reality.  
  
Hatori wasn't a fool, though. He knew all along about Momiji's feelings.  
  
Even though he couldn't gage his own feelings or express them very well, he could read everyone, even Akito. It wasn't hard when you were their family doctor. And a cousin at that.  
  
Of course, he had known.  
  
How could even tolerate being with Momiji for so long?  
  
_Because_ he knew Momiji cared.  
  
Momiji could unravel him in a way that made him scared of the humanity within him. And so, he fled into Akito's unspoken cruelties because they weren't really intended to hurt him. There was still that glass surface that Akito wouldn't let him see, nor would he show some things to Akito as well.  
  
In the end, making love to him was all he could to express his confused thoughts.  
  
But not with Momiji. He couldn't do anything that would show or shouldn't show how he wanted to react or respond. He was at a standstill for all he knew.  
  
Momiji was more than a brother or a cousin to him.   
  
"Dammit, Momiji is Momiji..." he would always think inside of his head.   
  
A single fact that made him so confused in life, despite his logical thinking.  
  
The green eye continued to look at the river flowing below him.   
  
He wanted to see his own reflection at that moment, but he knew that wasn't possible. He was too ashamed to even look at himself in his utter weakness.  
  
All because of Momiji.  
  
Akito could wrap his body around him and hold him until he wouldn't let go, but he couldn't even begin to touch Momiji. There was something about Momiji that he didn't want to dirty with his hands or his self-hatred.  
  
He erased memories.  
  
He could be so cruel at times...  
  
But Momiji had loved him through it all.   
  
Unconditionally...selflessly...  
  
Why would he _want_ to stain Momiji with his peculiarities and the ugliness that shouldn't be there?  
  
"You should remain clean..." he mumbled to himself like an mental patient ready to jump off the bridge.  
  
"You're too young to understand this," he repeated to himself as he thought of Momiji's face before him.   
  
Then, he chuckled in denial as he watched the water flow below him. "Too young? You of all people..."  
  
Hatori had known where it would hurt and so he said it to penetrate into Momiji's being to that extreme extent.  
  
He let go of the wooden railings and pounded on them with his fists. Cringing his eye, he refused to cry. He was so resolute to not cry.  
  
For his lover Akito, he wouldn't cry.  
  
But for Momiji, he could.  
  
For all these years, he couldn't make himself fall out of love with Momiji. He had to stack everything around it so that he could ignore it.  
  
"Who else would know you better than me?!" Momiji shouted one day to him while Hatori was silently lamenting over Kana. No one else could have even guessed, but Momiji easily surmised the cause of his grief.  
  
It was at that moment that Momiji hugged him and cried for him while shaking his head. "It's not because my mother wanted to erase me from her mind. No, I don't understand because of that. I always understood because I know how far you would go to make someone happy. Even at the cost of hurting yourself."  
  
Wasn't that love, though?  
  
That's the way he had always seen it done, so how was he to know the difference between pain and love that was sweet?  
  
He had been confused at that moment when Momiji embraced him, reading him so easily.  
  
Hatori began to shake and two tears slipped into the water and floated away into the rush of water of the river. He wouldn't open his eye, though.  
  
He wasn't ready to face the rest of this day just yet.  
  
"You could have done anything else..." he whispered to himself as he touched his lips lightly. "Now, you've dirtied yourself because of me, Momiji."  
  
He opened his eye.  
  
Everything was so blurry.  
  
Hatori wished he could have cut off his hand at that moment...  
  
But would it have been too obvious a sacrifice for his dearly loved Momiji?  
  
"It's not a matter of understanding," he said to himself. "It's a matter of hierarchy. Akito and I are of the same level...and you are of a different plane. Always away from where I could reach you because you weren't meant to be with me.   
  
...I'll only drag you down with me, Momiji.  
  
And I'd rather kill myself than let you do that to yourself,  
  
Especially for my sake."  
  
He admired what he couldn't be.  
  
Tsuzuku...  
  
--  
  
Author's note: Ah, so we're wrenching it out, aren't we? 


End file.
